


Everything Has Grown

by stardropdream



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Hanahaki Disease, Happy Ending, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-22
Updated: 2018-06-22
Packaged: 2019-05-27 00:55:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15013175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stardropdream/pseuds/stardropdream
Summary: Dorian waits and he waits and he waits for the flowers to burst from his throat.





	Everything Has Grown

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, let's pretend it hasn't been literally six months since I wrote a thing. Sigh. 
> 
> This was a request from tumblr for "hanahaki disease with a happy ending." I should go ahead and note that there isn't anything explicit re: hanahaki disease, if you're sensitive to those types of descriptions. I am not super familiar with hanahaki disease as a trope but I'm pretty sure that I got this idea for this fic from a tumblr post floating around.

Dorian knows the signs well, has seen it enough in Tevinter to know to expect it. He’s seen enough men trip their way out of the brothels he once frequented with handkerchiefs pressed to their coughing mouths, as if that fooled anyone. Dorian knows the look, the way the cheeks pale, the wheezing sound of the throat box even once the coughing subsides. Trails of petals discretely discarded.

Despite so much, Dorian at least has avoided the illness up until now. Perhaps that’s the consequence, this fear of ever getting too close, of ever letting that desire sink into his blood and set him afire, turn him into thorned flower he was always meant to be, beautiful and fleeting. Dorian never saw such beauty in the affliction, saw nothing worth celebrating in unreturned love, in the way friends with _eccentric_ tastes (as his father would mockingly call it) rotted away, the reason always unpronounced. 

Now life in the South, as with so many things, is similar and different. He’s drinking at the Charger’s usual table with Bull at his side, the Chargers around them and the tavern full of song and bright laughter, the clinking of glasses, the sloshing of bad ale that Dorian still, somehow, is willing to drink. 

There’s enough din in the tavern, and with early winter setting in there have been more than enough colds going around that Dorian almost doesn’t associate the sound of coughing with affliction. It isn’t until later, much later, when Dorian rises to refill his and Bull’s drinks that he sees petals on the floor, trailing away and out the door. He doesn’t even know who the poor sap is, who suddenly was caught in a fit, but it leaves him cold for a moment. He’s quick to school his expression again. 

It must show on his face, though, because Bull looks at him closely as he comes back, sets the drinks down, and sits rigidly down beside him.

“You alright?” Bull asks, picking up his drink and taking a sip, his eye still on Dorian. 

And that’s the thing about Bull, really, the way that Dorian is _seen_ when Bull looks— not a passive regarding, but an observing. It used to unsettle him terribly, to think that Bull was analyzing him, assessing and breaking down every little flinch in Dorian’s face. Now, there’s a definite comfort in knowing that he is known. Bull’s hand is warm and heavy on his thigh, and that too is a reassurance— some sort of weighted need in the midst of a world that punishes desire, both requited and unrequited. And that’s the thing about this fucking he’s been doing with Bull, a sort of liberation from fear, just giving into desire without expectation. 

“Quite alright,” he says and knows that Bull knows it’s a lie, and also knows that Bull knows not to press it, not here, not like this. Bull’s hand slides over his thigh, squeezes just above his knee, and he’s understood. There’s comfort in that, too. They drink, have a few more rounds, and then Dorian pulls Bull up to his room and forgets about everything else for a little while. 

It’s mundane, the moment he realizes he loves Bull. It isn’t even a moment. Just a culmination of things. It’s watching the light from Bull’s open window slice across his chest in the morning, when Dorian finally stops sneaking away in the middle of the night. It’s seeing Bull scratch absently at the base of his horns enough to motivate Dorian to go hunting down the requisition request for balm even though Bull never asked for it. It’s the way his chest feels lighter when Bull laughs, shoves playfully at Krem’s shoulder. It’s how he instinctively approaches Bull now from the right side, waits for the way his good eye slants over towards him and his mouth quirks up into a crooked smile. It’s the jokes on the road with the Inquisitor, hearing Bull and Sera behind him. 

It’s watching Bull head out of Skyhold with the Chargers, watching his retreating back. Dorian’s arms folded together against the wall of the ramparts, watching him retreat, far enough away that shouting after him is impossible, but close enough that he can still make out Bull’s shape. 

And Bull turning around at the last moment, finding him, and waving once before turning and continuing on his way. 

Dorian, his hand raised to wave back, lingering in the air, and the quiet, “Oh,” captured away by the wind, unheard by anyone but him. And what a mundane, ridiculous gesture it is, to be waving like he’s some schoolboy, like he’s some wayward, pining spouse. _Oh._

_Oh. I love him._

And he waits for the scratching in the throat, the first sign of the disease. Waits for his room to fill with flowers. He drinks more, alone at the bar, and waits. Waits and waits— waits for the sign of his end, waits for Bull to return. 

The end never does arrive, but Bull does. 

Dorian keeps breathing, unhindered and undisrupted. The Chargers return from their job and Dorian wants to rush over and find him, but takes his time, sees the Chargers first as they settle back into Skyhold, sliding into place as easily as if they’ve always been there— and Dorian envies that easy belonging. 

When he sees Bull again, there’s a weight in his chest, a quiet expectation. Bull’s mouth is crooked with his smile when he sees Dorian and something inside Dorian’s chest flips. Bull waves a bit in greeting and says, “Thought you’d be at the gate.” 

“I do have actual duties to attend to around here, you know,” Dorian sniffs back, but there’s no bite to the words as there might have been months ago, when they first started. Bull’s smile widens, and that used to be enough cause to infuriate Dorian. Instead, now, he finds himself smiling back. 

“Miss me?” Bull asks, grinning. 

“Please,” Dorian answers, which is not an answer at all and he knows that Bull knows what he doesn’t say. 

He pauses, as if waiting again for that feeling to twist up in his chest, to feel a flower blooming in his throat. It doesn’t arrive. Bull’s smile has gone soft in light of Dorian’s mock sour mood. 

Dorian clears his throat and steps forward, curls his fingers around Bull’s harness and tugs him down. It’s not nearly enough force to move Bull unless he wants to be moved, but Bull does obediently duck down and kiss him in greeting. It’s soft at first, almost gentle, before Bull bites down on his bottom lip and elicits a soft chuckle from Dorian. 

He pushes him back, licking his bottom lip. “You brute.” 

“Yeah,” Bull laughs and his hand finds Dorian’s hip, keeping him close. He’s watching him again, his eye scanning across Dorian’s face, just observing him. “You look good.”

“I always look good, so I’ll thank you for stating the obvious,” Dorian snorts. Then adds, “You smell like a bog.” 

“You like it,” Bull answers easily, a common rejoiner to such a complaint. 

Dorian slides his hand up Bull’s chest and rests at the junction between neck and shoulder, and says nothing in response. There’s no point in lying to someone who knows how you lie, after all. 

And just as his first realization arrived in a mundane moment, so too does the second. He watches the way Bull looks at him, soft and fond, hand firm on his hip. The thought unfurls slowly across his mind and as soon as he thinks it, he knows it’s true. _Oh,_ he thinks. _He loves me, too._

There’s more weight to the realization that someone is in love with him and it’s someone he loves back. It’s stranger still that it’s the Iron Bull of all people. But just as soon as the thought rolls over him, the lack of flowers festering in his gut feels an obvious absence. 

He feels the heat in his cheeks, knows that Bull, keen observer as he is, has noted the change— although Dorian can’t begin to guess if he can know what he’s thinking. It’s just as well. He hates confessions, hates the vulnerability that grips over him there, hates the giving over of such power. 

“Well,” Dorian says at last, now that he’s let the silence lapse on for too long. It feels too obvious now, his skin buzzing. 

Bull raises his eyebrows, expectantly. “Well,” he parrots when Dorian offers no other words. His crooked smile is back, teasing and playful and ridiculously arousing. “Wanna go somewhere?” 

Dorian could make a joke about it or at least offer something scathing. Instead, he reaches his hand up and curls around Bull’s horn, tugging him down to kiss him again, slow and deep. He can’t say the words yet but he can put it into actions, at least, can pour it all into Bull like this. When he pulls away again, his breathing is free and unhindered, as is Bull’s. Strange, that he should be more familiar with the signs of unrequited love than anything else, that mutuality should leave him feeling unanchored. 

“If you must,” Dorian finally settles on. “It has been a while.”

“Knew you missed me,” Bull laughs, and tugs Dorian along. 

Dorian rolls his eyes, but doesn’t pull his hand back or let Bull let go. “I suppose it’s just as well that you’re back.” 

It’s far from a confession, but it’s a start. He walks with Bull across Skyhold’s courtyard, the green grass around them, no petals in sight.

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi [on my tumblr](http://stardropdream.tumblr.com/)!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Dandelions Make Bad Wine](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15867321) by [SetAblaze](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SetAblaze/pseuds/SetAblaze)




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